Confirmation of phorate, terbufos, and their sulfoxides and sulfones in water by capillary gas chromatography/chemical ionization mass spectrometry.

A gas chromatographic/mass spectrometric method capable of confirming phorate, terbufos, their sulfoxides, and sulfones in water is reported. Parents and their metabolites are separated in less than 5 min using a short capillary GC column and high carrier gas linear velocities. Positive ion chemical ionization mass spectrometry generates (M + H) ions indicative of the different molecular weights of the analytes and at least one confirmatory fragment ion for each analyte. Residues have been qualitatively confirmed at the 1 ppb level in fortified water samples from a variety of sources. Apparent residues in control water were less than 0.1 ppb.